The median home in El Dorado Hills sold for $904,401 over the three months ending August 2026, down 7.7% from $980,000 a year earlier — one of the steeper year-over-year price declines among Sacramento-area communities. Yet the pullback came alongside a notable increase in sales activity, according to newly released data from Redfin, painting a more nuanced picture than the headline number alone suggests.

Prices down, but per-square-foot up

The nearly $76,000 drop in the median sale price stands out, but a competing signal complicates the story. The median price per square foot actually rose 4.2% year over year, from $353 to $368. That divergence suggests buyers shifted toward smaller homes rather than a broad decline in property values — the typical El Dorado Hills sale simply covered less square footage than it did a year ago. On a month-over-month basis, the median price edged up 2.2% from $885,000 in the three months ending July.

For longer-term context, the current median remains slightly below the $925,000 recorded two years ago and roughly in line with the $915,000 seen five years ago, when prices were about 1.2% higher than today. In other words, El Dorado Hills prices have moved sideways over the past half-decade even as much of the region climbed.

Buyers turned out in greater numbers

Sales rose 16.1% year over year, with 231 homes changing hands compared with 199 in the same period of 2025. That is a meaningful pickup in a market of this size — El Dorado Hills has a population of about 51,000. Inventory grew in step, with 507 active listings, up 15.8% from 438 a year earlier, giving buyers more choices than they had last summer.

Even with that added supply, the market remains tilted toward sellers. Months of supply stood at 2.2, meaning it would take a little over two months to sell every listed home at the current sales pace — a level generally considered a tight sellers’ market. Homes sold at a median of 99.0% of their asking price, and 22.7% of sales closed above list, slightly higher than the 21.1% share a year ago.

Homes took a median of 32 days to sell, unchanged from a year earlier. Compared with the three months ending July, however, that figure lengthened from 26 days, a 23.1% increase that reflects the typical late-summer slowdown as the spring buying rush fades.

Affordability and the mortgage math

Lower prices have translated into real savings for buyers, even as borrowing costs held roughly steady. The 30-year fixed mortgage rate averaged 6.67% in August 2026, little changed from 6.59% a year earlier, according to Freddie Mac. At current prices and rates, the monthly principal-and-interest payment on a median-priced home with 20% down works out to about $4,654 — roughly $347 less per month than the $5,002 a comparable buyer would have faced a year ago, when prices were higher.

Still, El Dorado Hills remains an expensive place to buy. The median home costs about 5.5 times the median household income of $165,349, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, above the 5x threshold generally considered unaffordable. That monthly payment consumes roughly 34% of median household monthly income — stretched, though not out of reach by standard measures.

Nationally, home prices continued to rise modestly, with the S&P/Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price Index up year over year — a contrast to the decline recorded locally.

Recent momentum

The month-over-month figures point to a market easing into its seasonal cooldown. Sales dipped 5.3% from the three months ending July, when 244 homes sold, and both new listings and active inventory pulled back slightly. New listings totaled 273 for the current period, down from 311 a month earlier, while active inventory eased 3.2% to 507. Taken together, the summer data shows a market where buyers gained both leverage and lower prices, even as the underlying supply picture stayed tight enough to keep sellers in a favorable position on the homes that did sell.